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On Sept. 19, a magnitude 7.1 earthquake struck Mexico City and the surrounding region, demolishing buildings, killing hundreds, and trapping and injuring many more. More than 3,000 structures were damaged in Mexico City alone, according to news reports.

The disaster galvanized Mexican students in the MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning (DUSP) to construct a crowdsourcing platform designed to link those in need of help with volunteers best positioned to assist with specific needs.

Using the online platform, Manos a la Obra, affected individuals and volunteers can post requests and offers for various types of aid, such as medical services, shelter, food, and water, as well as their contact information so that they can communicate directly. The information collected by the platform is geolocated and displayed on a map in real-time to allow organizations and individuals the ability to tailor aid responses to each request.

The platform’s capacity to disseminate information quickly and target aid efforts efficiently has led to its adoption by volunteers, civil organizations, and other networks in Mexico. In the first 48 hours after the earthquake, the platform collected over 1,000 aid offers and requests throughout the affected region of Central Mexico and beyond. Aid offers continue to be rapidly organized and publicized, facilitating logistics for aid workers on the ground in Mexico City and the affected area.

The group behind the platform includes graduate students Daniel Heriberto Palencia, Akemi Matsumoto, Ricardo Alvarez, and Carlos Sainz Caccia from DUSP and the MIT Senseable City Lab. The team is now concentrating their efforts on linking the site’s information with volunteers, aid distribution centers, and logistic partners on the ground to deploy aid more quickly.

“We encourage those who would like to support victims in and around Mexico City to visit Manos a la Obra and share the platforms with their networks to ensure their help reaches the right people, at the right time,” says the team.